Toking another shot at medical marijuana law (updates in bold face)

The Marijuana Policy Project is hitting the airwaves today with an ad aimed at getting the state Legislature to approve a bill allowing patients to use marijuana for medical purposes. The group also advocates legalization of marijuana to make its status under the law similar to that of alcohol.

The ad, running in targeted markets — the Buffalo area, Long Island, and the Troy/Albany/Schenectady area through June 19 — features Kingston resident Burton Aldrich, a quadriplegic who, according to the ad, relies on marijuana to control the excruciating pain and violent spasms related to his condition.

In the ad, Aldrich says the pain and spasms go away after he uses pot.

“I use medical marijuana with my doctors’ support because I can’t find anything that works as well with as few side effects,” Aldrich said in a news release from the Marijuana Policy Project. “I have no choice but to break the law in order to find relief. That’s wrong. I’m counting on the Senate to do the sensible, compassionate thing and make it right.”

Assembly Health Committee Chairman Richard Gottfried, D-Manhattan, has sponsored legislation that would legalize medical marijuana in the state. It passed the chamber last year, 95-52, but hasn’t moved in the Senate. Gottfried in the release notes that under current law, “we must arrest sick and dying patients for seeking relief from debilitating pain…There’s no excuse for this cruel injustice.”

Gottfried aide Bryan O’Malley said the bill is back this year with some modifications to address issues that were raised by the Health Department and Senate, including a provision that medical pot would be distributed only by certain registered entities, such as organizations similar to the “cannibis clubs” in California, pharmacies and hospitals. The state would also create a provision to allow certified producers to grow marijuana in the state.

In the Capitol Region, the spots include time on Capital News 9 and Capitol Tonight; CNN (Larry King, Newsroom); and — you saw this coming, of course — the Colbert Report on Comedy Central.

Advocates and users of medical marijuana were lobbying for the bill around the Capitol today, with a list that includes a former New York City police officer from Northport who retired because of a service disability that left him in extreme pain, a cancer survivor from the Bronx who was arrested for using marijuana to treat her appetite loss; and a longtime HIV patient.